Each month, National Geographic magazine features breathtaking photographs in Visions of Earth. Browse through visions of the world as seen through a photographer's eye.

Photograph by Dina Litovsky, Polaris

December 2014

Japan—A young woman rides an escalator through the kaleidoscopic entrance to the Tokyu Plaza Omotesando Harajuku mall in Tokyo. Behind her, mirrors reflect the images of shoppers in one of the city’s most fashionable districts.

Photograph by Nurcholis Anhari Lubis, Getty Images

December 2014

Indonesia—At a slaughterhouse in Kertasura dead snakes are rolled up before being sold for food or traditional medicine. Villagers hunt the reptiles to supplement their income—and feed the billion-dollar global snake trade.

Photograph by Danish Siddiqui, Reuters

December 2014

India—Brides with henna-decorated hands wait for their group wedding to begin. Thirty-five couples in Mumbai participated in the ceremony, which was arranged by a Muslim social organization to cut costs for poor families.

Photograph by Scott Stulberg

November 2014

United States—Lightning strikes in Grand Canyon National Park about 26,000 times each year. Most bolts hit the rim of the canyon in northern Arizona. But some—like this one, captured in a 25-second exposure—can hurtle from cloud to ground inside the canyon itself.

England—Dozens of muddy men clamber across ropes during the annual Tough Guy competition in Perton. The course—roughly eight miles of obstacles including fire, ice, mud, and barbed wire—draws thousands of hardy contestants each winter.

Photograph by Marian Drew

November 2014

Australia—Felled by a power line and dead of a broken neck, an Australian pelican becomes an unlikely still life in Brisbane. To turn tragedy into tableau, the photographer made this image using a flashlight and a long exposure—then buried the bird in her garden.

Photograph by Yva Momatiuk and John Eastcott

October 2014

Canada—On a gravel beach along the Bay of Fundy, two semipalmated sandpipers take off as hundreds more flock together. These six-inch-long shorebirds migrate thousands of miles a year from Arctic breeding grounds to South American coasts.

Photograph by Paul Souders, Corbis

October 2014

Canada—Two miles off the western coast of the Hudson Bay and just south of the Arctic Circle, a polar bear comes in for a close-up. As the winter pack ice melts in summer months, the world’s largest bears—a vulnerable species—must swim for shore.

Photograph by Mohammed Al-Shaikh, AFP/Getty Images

October 2014

Bahrain—In the village of Sanabis, a suburb of the capital, Manama, two Shiite girls take part in an Ashura ceremony. The annual holiday commemorates the seventh-century martyrdom of Husayn, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, founder of Islam.

Photograph by Kacper Kowalski, Panos Pictures

September 2014

Poland—Tricity Landscape Park turns verdant in spring-time. This image and the two that follow document the same spot in autumn and winter. To create these images, the photographer flew a powered paraglider over this tiny lake; that’s his shadow in the water.

Photograph by Kacper Kowalski, Panos Pictures

September 2014

Poland—Tricity Landscape Park in autumn.

Photograph by Kacper Kowalski, Panos Pictures

September 2014

Poland—Tricity Landscape Park in winter.

Photograph by Karim Sahib, AFP/Getty Images

August 2014

Emirate of Abu Dhabi—As the sun sets on the Liwa region, local tribesmen lead their camels to a grazing area in neighboring Saudi Arabia. These shifting sands create huge crescent-shaped dunes, which move slowly and can reach 500 feet high.

Photograph by Charlie Hamilton James

August 2014

England—In the village of Box, George Purser, 77, waters geraniums on a century-old portable steam boiler. He bought the self-propelled steam engine 33 years ago for $100. Before it became a flower bed, it was used to thresh corn and sterilize topsoil.

Photograph by Hasan Bağlar

August 2014

Cyprus—When Mediterranean mantises are startled, they wave their forelimbs and raise their wings to reveal vivid eyespot markings. These two adult females, each less than three inches long, were spotted in an alfalfa field near Nicosia.

Brazil—As a fast-moving storm engulfs Pedra da Gávea mountain, Caio Afeto seems to walk on clouds. The professional highliner was traversing two cliffs above Rio de Janerio when a coastal front blew in, hiding the half-mile-high summit in mist.

Photograph by Valter Bernardeschi

July 2014

Russia—Snared by a brown bear, a sockeye salmon spills a string of orange roe into Kuril Lake. Around a million of these fish swim from the Pacific Ocean to the Kamchatka Peninsula each summer to spawn—a book to bears fattening up for winter hibernation.

Photograph by Julian Cohen

July 2014

Papua New Guinea—In Milne Bay schools of fish swirl around the coral-encrusted piles of a crumbling wharf. The warm waters—part of the biologically rich Coral Triangle marine area—are home to thousands of fish species.

Photograph by Hannover Police/AP Images

June 2014

Germany—The head of a trapped red squirrel pokes through a manhole cover in Isernhagen. Police freed the rodent by gently pushing back its ears and drizzling olive oil on its neck. But the ordeal proved too stressful, and the squirrel did not survive.

Photograph by Lefteris Pitarakis, AP Images

June 2014

England—To celebrate the 60th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation, Princess Anne’s dress holds court in Buckingham Palace. Nearly three years old at the time of her mother’s ceremony, Anne was deemed too young to attend.

Photograph by Tomasz Tomaszewski

June 2014

Poland—On their way to harvest grain in Policzna, a woman and her grandson share a horse-drawn cart with a horse-headed volunteer promoting a traveling festival. The surreal attire was ignored by the farming-focused villagers.

Photograph by Kyle McBurnie

May 2014

United States—A hundred miles off the southern California coast, near the Cortes Bank, a curious harbor seal peers through a kelp forest. The kelp is a rich habitat for many marine species. The swaying stalks offer seals a fish buffet—and safety from predators.

Photograph by Pham Ty

May 2014

Vietnam—On the Huong River in Hue, young women in traditional garb float paper-flower candles—lights for lost souls pardoned every July 15. The Buddhist holiday began in medieval China. Today it’s celebrated throughout Asia.

Brazil—Dozens of bioluminescent mushrooms sprout on a dead log, green stems glowing in the light of a full moon. This species—Mycena lucentipes—grows on the wood of flowering trees in the rain forests of Brazil and Puerto Rico. Its edibility is unknown.

Photograph by Dado Ruvic, Reuters

April 2014

Bosnia and Herzegovina—In Mostar a competitive diver holds torches as he jumps from the Old Bridge into the Neretva River. The 78-foot-tall limestone span—completed in 1566, destroyed by war in 1993, reopened in 2004—is a World Heritage site.

Photograph by Daniel Ochoa de Olza, AP Images

April 2014

Spain—During the Descent of the Angel festival in Peñafiel, seven-year-old Pablo Leal Requejo “flies down” to remove the Virgin Mary’s veil of mourning. The Easter celebration may have evolved from medieval plays. It draws about 2,500 people each year.

Photograph by Denis Budkov

April 2014

Russia—Lit by a torch, an ice cave in a Kamchatka glacier glows like an entrance to the underworld. The pocked walls and ceiling are layers of compacted snow—more than 20 feet thick—carved by hot springs from the Mutnovsky Volcano.

Photograph by Thomas Dressler

March 2014

Namibia—Some 300 people a month trudge up the sandy slopes of desert dunes near Swakopmund for the novelty of “sandboarding.” Fans say sand is a bit slower than snow—but much softer if you fall.

Photograph by Dean Treml, AFP Photo/Red Bull/Getty Images

March 2014

Portugal—Plummeting from a 95-foot precipice would unnerve most mortals, but “in that moment, everything is calm,” said Colombian diver Orlando Duque during the 2012 Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series. The nine-time world champion placed second.

Photograph by Brian Buckland

March 2014

United States—Joining hands in a heads-first free fall to form a human snowflake, 138 skydivers set a world record at Skydive Chicago in August 2012. The upside-down photographer bit a switch in his mouth to trigger a helmet camera.

Photograph by Cristina Garcia Rodero, Magnum Photos

February 2014

United States—Behind a theater window at Florida’s Weeki Wachee Springs State Park, Nikki Chickonski swims through swirling bubbles. Strategically placed air hoses allow the mermaids to take in lungfuls of air, then perform unencumbered by scuba tanks.

Photograph by Hans Strand

February 2014

Iceland—The colorful rhyolite mountains of the Landmannalaugar highlands are a popular hiking destination in Iceland’s southern interior. Getting there can be hard: Local roads aren’t paved, and rivers run across them. They must be forded using four-wheel drive.

Photograph by David Butow/Seeing Buddha

February 2014

Bhutan—Robes fly as monks practice a traditional dance in the courtyard of the Rinpung Dzong, a fortress and monastery complex dating from 1646—and now a seat of district government—located in Bhutan’s Paro Valley.

Photograph by Charlie Hamilton James

January 2014

United Kingdom—Heather fires smoke during a controlled burn in West Burrafirth in Shetland. This form of management, known as muirburn, clears old brush to improve both grazing conditions and wildlife habitat.

Photograph by Peter Delaney

January 2014

South Africa—Through the dust of a dry riverbed in Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, an African white-backed vulture advances on an antelope carcass. The bird's outstretched wings help it look larger and more threatening to rival vultures.

Photograph by Gera Artemova, Anzenberger

January 2014

Ukraine—Men in masks and costumes travel from house to house—playing jokes on whoever answers the door—during Melanka, a folk holiday celebrated on January 13, the Julian calendar's New Year’s Eve. These revelers live in Kosmach, a Hutsul village in the Carpathian highlands.